The number of hours they spend caring for their steer is nearly too high to count. But the money they could win keeps them coming back to the Fort Worth Stock Show and Rodeo.
Hundreds of junior exhibitors are settling into the Will Rodgers Memorial Center.
They are unloading livestock trailers for the annual Fort Worth Stock Show and Rodeo’s Junior Sale of Champions.
Cameron Chappell drove ten hours from Raymondville, Texas.
“I’ve been showing cattle six years now. So it’s been a little while,” Chappell said.
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This year, Chappell brought a steer he’s raised since birth, or as he put it “straight out of the cow.”
This is the largest arrival of animals at the Stock Show each year.
In 2015, there was a record $3.7 million in bids for the livestock.
Josh Odom from Mabank, Texas said raising a steer is a very intense, time consuming process.
“You’ve got to be with him all the time. Blowing, washing, feeding," Odom said.
Odom is a junior in high school, so if he wins money at the Stock Show this year, he wants to buy another steer. Next year his money will go to pay for college.
Last year’s top winner used part of her money for college. The teenager from Round Rock’s Grand Champion Steer, Bob Marley, went for a record price of $240,000.
